Is There Only One ‘Day of the Lord’?

In Joel Richardson’s podcast “The One Prophecy that Debunks Preterism, Replacement Theology & the Lies of the Anti-Semites,” he began with comments about “the day of the Lord.” He then tried to show that Ezekiel 38 cannot be interpreted as fulfilled prophecy. It’s the only way it can be interpreted, as I point out in my book The Gog and Magog End-Time Alliance. Richardson claimed that I argue the fulfillment occurred during the Assyrian period. Nonsense. I said no such thing. It took place during the Persian period, specifically as described in the book of Esther (1:1). The Assyrian Empire collapsed rapidly after 612 BC, when a coalition of Babylonians and Medes sacked Nineveh, destroying the Assyrian heartland by 609 BC. My podcast response to Richardson’s claim will post tomorrow.

Before trying to refute a preterist interpretation using Ezekiel 38, Richardson claimed that there is only a single day of the Lord, and that it is yet to come. Here are his extended comments:

It is important to recognize … how the New Testament interprets and understands the day of the Lord…. This is the interpretive key. If anyone disagrees with … [or] wants to argue with what I’m saying, it is unarguable that the New Testament interprets the day of the Lord as one consummate singular future day of the Lord. The New Testament never once refers to days of the Lord. You’ll never see “day of the Lord” plural in the New Testament. Nor will you ever see the coming of the Lord, or the revealing of the Lord, or the appearing of the Lord, plural. It is always the singular coming of the Son of Man, the appearing of the Lord, the revealing of the Lord. The coming of Jesus and the day of the Lord are always combined together into one event. In fact, the New Testament refers to it as the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. So, the New Testament takes the Old Testament day of Yahweh, the day of the Lord, and the New Testament multiple times actually calls it the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now I’ll challenge any preterist. Show me a single verse anywhere in the New Testament that speaks of the day of the Lord or the coming of the Lord in the plural tense…. I mean in the plural. It simply does not exist.

I agree that “days of the Lord” is not used in the Bible. Even so, there is no single “day of the Lord.” The “day of the Lord” is any time God comes to judge (evaluate), as we see, for example, in Zephaniah (Zeph. 2:2), “the day of the LORD’s anger comes upon you,” that is, in Zephaniah’s day (see 1:1-6). The “you” was them. The phrase appears more than two dozen times, primarily in the books of Isaiah (2:12), Joel (2:11), and Amos (5:18-20), and often refers to temporal events such as foreign invasions, the capture of cities, or divine judgment on Israel and its enemies. The day of the Lord was said to be “near” (Isa. 13:6-22; Ezek. 30:2-19). John Walvoord, a futurist like Richardson, says this about the “day of the Lord.”

The “Day of the Lord” is an expression frequently used in both the Old and New Testaments to describe any period of time during which God exercises direct judgment on human sin. The Old Testament records a number of times when Israel endured a day of the Lord, lasting a few days or, in some cases, several years.[1]

Walter Baker, in his commentary on Obadiah, states something similar: “The Day of the LORD may refer to any time God judges by entering into world affairs (e.g., Ezek. 30:3…).”[2] You don’t have to be a preterist to acknowledge that there were many days of the Lord.

At this point, Richardson should take up his claims about multiple days of the Lord with other futurists. They do not agree with his interpretation that there is only one end-time “day of the Lord.” Let’s look at some New Testament passages.

“For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord is coming just like a thief in the night.” Literally, it reads, “there is coming a day of the Lord.” The definite article “the” is absent in the Greek. Who is Paul addressing? The Thessalonians. “But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day [of the Lord] would overtake you like a thief” (1 Thess. 5:2). What “day” is Paul referring to? The same day that Jesus warned the generation of His day about events that were to take place before their generation passed away: “Be on guard, so that your hearts will not be weighted down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of life, and that day will not come on you suddenly like a trap” (Luke 21:34). Paul was not describing events that would take place in the distant future. See the book The Destruction of Jerusalem, the Mysterious Language of St. Paul’s Description of the Man of Sin, and the Day of the Lord by Nehemiah Nisbett (1787).

The Destruction of Jerusalem, the Mysterious Language of St. Paul’s Description of the Man of Sin, and the Day of the Lord

For most modern readers, Nehemiah Nisbett (d. 1812) is an unknown writer. He’s almost never quoted or cited, and yet his works were widely read in his day. He was most noted for his works dealing with the defense of Christianity against skeptics. Most of Nisbett’s works dealt with eschatology. Nisbett would be described as a preterist on passages that many partial preterists would say are yet to be fulfilled. This is especially true of his interpretation of 1 Thessalonians 5. This new version of Nisbett’s two outstanding apologetic works is a welcome addition to any Christian’s library.

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What do we make of Acts 2:20 and Peter’s mention of “the great and glorious day of the Lord”: “‘THE SUN WILL BE TURNED INTO DARKNESS AND THE MOON INTO BLOOD, BEFORE THE GREAT AND GLORIOUS DAY OF THE LORD COMES. Peter quotes Joel and explained, “This is what has been spoken through the prophet Joel” (2:16). What does “this” refer to? The events that took place at Pentecost. John R. Stott stated, “Peter introduces his sermon with the words ‘this is that’ ([Acts 2:]16, AV), i.e, ‘this’ which his hearers have witnessed is ‘that’ which Joel foretold,”[3] the day of the Lord. F. F. Bruce makes a similar point: “Joel, like other Old Testament prophets, had spoken of what was going to take place in the ‘last days.’ Peter’s quotation of this prophecy [at Pentecost] means that these days, the days of fulfillment of God’s purpose, have arrived.”[4] John Lightfoot (1602-1675) comments:

There is much mention of the ‘last days’ in Scripture, which in most places is not to be understood of the last days of the world, as some take them and so mistake, but of the last days of Jerusalem and the Jewish state. And indeed, the greatest mercies that were promised to that people were promised to occur in those last days [Isa. 2:2; Hos. 3:5; Joel 2:28] as he is cited by this our apostle [Acts 2:17]: these things are not to be allotted to the last days of the world, but to the last days of that city; as Peter’s very allegation out of Joel makes it plain, if there were no more proof. “Now (saith he) is fulfilled that, which was spoken by the prophet Joel, ‘In the last days I will pour out,’” &c. These are the ‘last days,’ there intended, and now the thing hath received its accomplishment. For, how improper is it to construe him in such a sense as some do, — This is that which, Joel foretold, should come to pass in the last days of the world, two or three thousand years hence.[5]

Thomas Ice, also a dispensationalist, argues: “But this is [like] that which was spoken by the prophet Joel.” He tries to explain the addition of “like” by claiming that “The unique statement of Peter (‘this is that’) is in the language of comparison and similarity, not fulfillment.”[6] So much for the literal interpretation of the Bible. He begs the question, assuming what he must first prove. Dispensational author Stanley D. Toussaint writes, contradicting Ice, “This clause does not mean, ‘This is like that’; it means Pentecost fulfilled what Joel had described.”[7]

What do we make of 2 Thessalonians 2:2, “that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit, or a message, or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come.” The KJV has “is near.” This is incorrect. The Greek word for “near” is not used. If the “day of the Lord” refers to the second coming, what evidence was there for it? No one had been taken to heaven. Jesus had not physically appeared. The saints were not taken off the earth. How could Paul have written a letter if either the rapture or the second coming had taken place? I cover 2 Thessalonians 2 in my books Last Days Madness and The Antichrist, Beasts, the Man of Lawlessness, and 666.

The Antichrist, Beasts, the Man of Lawlessness, and 666

Many today mistakenly use antichrist and beast interchangeably. Generally, a Christian hears the word antichrist and thinks of the beast in the book of Revelation. The number 666 has long fascinated theologians and mathematicians. Maybe the interest in the number has something to do with the attainment of wisdom and understanding since to “calculate the number of the beast” will reward the diligent (Rev. 13:18). The first readers were to have “understanding” to “calculate the number of the Beast” (Rev. 13:18). The Beast must have been a contemporary of the first-century readers. We can have the same “understanding” by studying the history of the period. We don’t have to speculate on the identity of some future Beast.

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In addition to Richardson’s comments about the day of the Lord, he also stated, “The coming of Jesus and the day of the Lord are always combined together into one event.” Ok, so what does he do with James 5:7-9?

Therefore be patient, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near. Do not complain, brothers and sisters, against one another, so that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing right at the door.

Much more could be said about the day of the Lord and related passages, but I think this will suffice for now.

[1] John F. Walvoord, Prophecy: 14 Essential Keys to Understanding the Final Drama (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 1993), 114-115.

[2] Walter L. Baker, The Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament, eds. John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 1457.

[3] John R. W. Stott, The Spirit, the Church, and the World: The Message of Acts (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1990), 73.

[4] F. F. Bruce, The Book of Acts in The New International Commentary on the New Testament, rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1988), 60-61.

[5] John Lightfoot, Whole Works of the Rev. John Lightfoot, ed. John Rogers Pitman, 13 vols. (London: J.F. Dove, 1822), 6:292.

[6] Thomas Ice, “Acts,” in Tim LaHaye, ed. Prophecy Study Bible (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2000), 1187.

[7] Stanley D. Toussaint, “Acts,” The Bible Knowledge Commentary: New Testament, John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1983), 358.

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